The Hearty Roar of Autumn

I wonder when our dog Mugsi guessed that
the leaves she used to chase weren’t alive. Wait,
I tell her, they’re beings that require
breath to blow them across amber colored

yards. The same breath that propels the winds of
life, prompts our lungs through their vibrant days.
The same wind that skitters leaves across boulevards
and prairies, makes them bow and sway—their duty

to gods, maybe angels, maybe not.
The same wind that intones the hearty roar
of autumn and that, along with loam and
leaf, carries the aroma of Lebenstod,

the fragrance of the withered, the fallen—
of what no longer respires but inspires.